Zipcar coming to Hollywood and Western Red Line Station

Tomorrow morning, car-sharing service Zipcar is deploying its fleet into the heart of Hollywood. The new service, called Zipcar on the Street, brings another valuable addition to the urban transportation toolkit, helping travelers make that tricky last-mile connection to their destination or providing car-free Angelenos with easy access to short-term car rentals.

Up until now, Zipcar has typically operated out of parking lots at universities. In Los Angeles County, the service has been primarily geared towards college students, with locations at UCLA, USC, CalTech, Cal State Long Beach and the Claremont Colleges.

In September, the L.A. City Council approved allocating ten parking spots to Zipcars at the urging of Council President Eric Garcetti, who expressed his desire to bring more sustainable transportation options to the 13th District.

Renting a Zipcar requires a $50 annual membership and an extra $8 per hour of usage, which covers everything from gas to maintenance and insurance. For those who occassionally want the flexibility of a car, but who don’t use it enough to justify the expenses, a car share membership can help find that happy medium.

Update 1:44pm: As commenter Heather points out, local car sharing operator LAXCarShare currently has cars stationed at eight locations throughout the L.A. area, including quite a few very close to Metro Rail stations at Union Station, Pershing Square, 8th Street and Flower, and Wilshire and Normandie.

The official announcement was just this morning, so you might give it a couple days for everything to get sorted out. It also looks like there will be a total of ten vehicles spread around Hollywood in five different locations, not necessarily at the Hollywood and Western Metro station.

I’ll try to do a follow-up when they’ve actually got the Zipcars on the street.